Times it's important to apologize
When you have asked for a scoop of tuna salad on gluten-free bread, and the guy says "We don't have gluten-free bread right now, but I can carry it," and you start laughing and laughing politely at his weird joke, and then you realize that he didn't mean he could carry the tuna in his hands
When you are reading a printout of medieval Jewish gynecological texts for class while standing on the subway, and the printout keeps flopping onto a woman's head because you're also holding a canned organic oat milk latte and it's hard to hold both things, and she makes an expression like you have just peed on her
When you have posted to your Instagram, in succession, a mournful blue-eyed photo of yourself wearing a coronavirus mask and an endorsement of Mike Bloomberg
When you have dramatically flung open the door to Planted, a vegan and gluten-free cafe in Carroll Gardens, to holler: "YOU NEED TO GET RID OF THIS SIGN! ON THE STREET! IT'S BLOCKING PASSERBY! I'M SERIOUS, HELLO! I'M SERIOUS!" And everyone looks up at their laptops to stare at you, and you stare back, and a four-year-old starts crying, and a siren wails in the distance, and nobody moves, and somebody politely says, "Ma'am, can you please close the door? It's very cold"
When, shortly before going to the emergency room for a spider bite, you text Stassi at 2 AM to say "I will literally kick u the fuck out of tomtom" after finding out you were left out of the planning process for her book party
When a scientist hands you a section of an ice core, of which there are ~15 in the entire world, and a little bit of it crumbles in your hand
When you push Tiny Daniel off the big tree on Pa's farm, and he stares at you as he falls in slow motion, the word "Whaa-y-y-y" forming at the tip of his mouth, and then before hitting the ground he grows wings and flies away as a bird boy, never to speak human words again
When you watched your boyfriend climb up a difficult rock wall and later tell him and his friends that he looked like a "beautiful fairy dancing up the rocks," and no one says anything for a moment
When you have walked past someone on the street, and have in fact done nothing besides walk past them, but still, sorry needs to be said
Love,
Ellie
Image via YouTube